Sword of Time
by Ice Prince1
Summary: The Team worry about Hotch


**Title**: Sword of Time  
><strong>Author<strong>: Ice_Prince1  
><strong>Fandom<strong>: Criminal Minds

**Rating**: T+

**Pairing**: Team, H/R est  
><strong>Disclaimer<strong>: I wish they were mine, but I only played with them a little.  
><strong>Summary<strong>: The team reacting to Hotch being shot. TG's birthday.

**Painless **

Derek sat in the waiting room. The turmoil within him making it hard to just sit and wait. He was 10, his father was in the hospital somewhere. He wasn't sure his dad was even alive. He'd tried praying, so far it hadn't given him any peace like people said it would.

His dad who taught him to throw a ball, to read the stories he loved so well, right from wrong, who taught him how proud he was to be a cop was somewhere in that hospital dying. He felt so very alone, his little sister sat next to him fidgeting, she didn't understand about Daddy being shot. How very final that sounded in his mind.

People told him his dad was a hero. All he knew was that he was dead.

He had tried so damned hard to live up to his father's image, to be a hero. He'd let himself down, his team, he'd let his team down. He'd let Hotch down. The only person who knew him for who he was, who knew his secrets, he'd let him down. And now Hotch, another hero, was in the ICU not even breathing on his own.

He heard David walk into the waiting room and settle in the seat next to him.

"Don't say anything."

"I won't, but I need to remind you of just the one thing."

Derek held his breath, restrained himself from beating Rossi to death. "It's my fault. Don't put this on anyone but me."

"Hotch would never blame you, you know that."

"I shouldn't have let him go in alone. I should have helped him."

"Come on Derek. Hotch puts himself in situations like this, it's what he has to do." Dave played his first card.

"But I've always got Hotch's back. He knows that, he fucking trusts me to have it."

Nodding, Dave agreed. "Morgan, listen, Hotch wrote the book on hostage negotiation. He knows the risks." Another card in play.

"If he dies, David, it's over for me."

"You're the team leader Derek. Think about it. Hotch relies on you, I rely on you." Another card on the table.

Closing his eyes, taking a breath, Derek regained a small amount of composure.

"Morgan, Reid is not handling this well." Dave played his last card.

Derek gave Dave a frown, "This is going to end the kid."

"Don't count Aaron out yet, Morgan. A few bullets, however many times he's been stabbed, he told me about some unsub that nearly strangled him, took him out at the knees…"

With effort Morgan rose from the chair, he stretched his shoulders as if placing leadership back onto them. "Let's go light a fire under a doctor or two Dave."

**Changes**

Reid was quietly falling apart. He knew the job was dangerous, he expected that he wouldn't last long in it. Maybe get killed, maybe have to leave. But never had he considered losing Hotch to it.

He'd seen Hotch put himself in danger. Regularly. Hotch could find ways to talk to an unsub. He'd seen the way he'd change into what the unsub needed to relate to. He's seen him go completely submissive, he's seen him go completely ballistic dominant, and he'd seen him become the sweet child any grandmother could talk to.

So when he went in to talk to the woman who'd killed three children in her care he'd started out a gentle man, understanding, willing to listen. The woman was beyond listening, was hearing louder voices, threatening voices. He'd gotten every one of the surviving children out of that daycare, talking to her gently, motioning the kids to move. No one could have known about the armor piercing bullets in her gun.

The bullet just blew through Hotch's Kevlar as if it were tissue. Catching him just below the collarbone, blowing through his chest. He'd taken one breath and collapsed. The team had rushed the unsub and she'd died without getting another shot off.

Reid had reached Hotch first and remembered holding the man to his chest. Medics had been on scene and they'd pulled Hotch from him.

He continued to kneel in Hotch's blood on the floor of the day care center 'till Emily and Dave had lifted him bodily and assisted him to the SUV.

Then he was sitting at the bed in the ICU after hours of surgery which no one believed Hotch would survive.

The ventilator sounded harsh. He swallowed against the scream in his throat.

**The game of life **

JJ clicked off her phone. Henry was already in bed and Will had sounded almost asleep. She couldn't in good conscience talk to him about what was happening. She walked the corridor outside the secured doors of the ICU.

She paced unhappily. Of course she should be handling this better. Of course the blood on her shirt wasn't bothering her so much she felt as if it were her own. As if her own lungs were not working.

Her eyes betrayed her. She couldn't look at anyone, she knew she couldn't cry. Hotch had told her, it was okay to break down sometimes, it made people see you as human. It's okay to cry with the team, on the jet, in your office. He'd confided that he should have done that as well.

She'd seen him fall apart when Haley died, and in a way she'd watched him for a long time worried about the darkness behind his normally fiery gaze. Sometimes she wondered if he put himself in harms way more often because of what happened with Haley. But she knew that Jack and Henry were what saved both their humanities.

The abyss at bay at the hands of two little children. She'd have to tell Henry that one day, she hoped she didn't have to tell Jack.

She moved purposefully through the ICU double doors and flashed her creds at the two FBI men guarding Hotch's door.

She lowered herself into the chair next to Reid's. "He loves you, Spence, don't for a moment think otherwise. This," and here her hand swept the room, all of this is part of the job. It sucks, but that's it. Don't you dare think he puts himself in harm's way for any reason but that he believes in the good of what he does, of what we all do."

Reid looked at her with eyes dark as night, "Thanks JJ. I know."

JJ nodded. "But we can't be afraid of this Reid. We need to do this job, it's that important."

**I'm gonna lose it anyway**

Dave didn't see himself as a very deep person, Philosophy was more Reid's thing. But he understood Aaron. He had burned with that need to right wrongs and make the world a better place when he was younger. Aaron had never lost that. He sat next to Morgan and felt nearly strangled for the right words. And words really were his thing.

He understood that the team needed a strong center. And that center had been that young man in that hospital bed whose fate no one knew right then. Dave just wasn't a leader type, he was a great senior advisor, but he'd never be the guy in charge.

He felt for once in his life out of his depth. He shared Derek's need to just hit something. Knowing it wouldn't actually make him feel better, he decided just to wait it out.

Surprising himself, he realized that Aaron had allowed him a second chance at this job. A second chance to do something right, something with meaning. He hadn't needed to.

Walking to a window, he stood looking out at the light green Virginia spring. There was a small patch of snow in a shadow across the street from the hospital. The cold made its way into him.

And for the first time in a very long time David Rossi prayed. He hated people who prayed for things. But he asked God to please help his friend, that he was a good man and father, he did good in the world. Please, thy will be done.

He hoped God's will coincided with his. But he'd go with what was best. And for the first time he wondered what would be best for his friend.

**The losing card **

She was pretty sure she'd never see Kevin again. But her sudden rage had certainly scared him. Her visceral scream had likely wakened her entire Georgetown building.

"Not Hotch." She whispered now as she drove as quickly and as safely as she could. "Please not Hotch."

Her mind kept playing the scene of the last time she'd seen him. He was smiling at one of her cat pictures. There was just a moment of his incredibly infectious laugh. She wished now she'd remembered which picture it was. They had a secret email relationship completely centered on LOLcats. He'd send her silly ones and she'd send him cute ones. Sometimes she'd rush out of her lab to be in the bullpen when he opened the mail, just on the off chance she'd see his smile try to break through.

Morgan had called her. She would never forget his voice, his broken voice. "Hotch's been shot." He said, his voice cracking dangerously.

"Oh no," Garcia could only think it meant one thing. "No, she cried. No Derek."

"He's in surgery, Baby, he may not make it. The doctors don't give much for his chances. The bullet…the bullet was a cop killer." And Derek had lost it.

A moment later David was on Derek's phone. "Garcia, if you want to see him….Say goodbye…" then David's voice broke off. "G-town hospital. We're in the ICU waiting area."

"Oh Dave, How's Reid?"

"Not good, we need you Garcia. Please." And David clicked off.

JJ met her at the door to the hospital. "Garcia, there's a chance he'll make it. We've been here five hours and we were just waiting. Oh God we were just waiting for the end."

"You're saying he could actually be okay."

"Well in maybe a couple months, he might be able to actually sit up and glare at us."

**This is all I have to say.**

Everything was white and silent. He wasn't sure if that was a good or bad thing.

He thought he got glimpses of people moving. As if there were a thick fog. Seattle fog he thought, but not the same.

"Haley?" he whispered, though his voice didn't reach his own ears. "Haley."

"Aaron, it's not your time is it?"

"I don't know. Maybe it is."

"Did you find love Aaron? Did life get better?"

"It did Haley, it was hard after you left. I couldn't stand living without you in the world, but there was Jack. Oh Haley you should see our Jack. He's still pretty small for his age, but he's smart Haley, he's such a good kid, we play soccer, he's pretty good. He loves reading Haley, like we do. He draws and writes stories. Haley, he's just so much like both of us."

"And I fell in love with Spencer. Do you remember him? He's a wonderful man. Caring, wonderfully smart. He is my heart. He knows me and still loves me."

"Aaron, I'm just so happy for you. I'm sorry for the last few years we were together. I always loved you. But your job scared me. Please don't hate me."

"Haley, I never hated you, not for one moment did I stop loving you."

"Even when you knew about Josh, you still were so gentle with me, with Jack. Aaron, please don't blame yourself for what I did. And Aaron, I don't blame you for George."

Nodding he looked toward the fog. There seemed to be a small clearing in it. Morgan sat there, almost as if he were waiting. Reid quietly nearby. JJ paced and Dave was strangely kneeling as if in prayer. Garcia walked up to him, grabbed his shirt front and seemed to be yelling at him.

His eyes didn't want to open, he could tell the world was going to be to damned bright. But he knew what Garcia was yelling.

It was days before the ventilator was removed and he breathed on his own.

"Spencer." He whispered, his voice like ten miles of gravel road.

Reid looked up and his smile seemed brighter even than the too bright room. "Hotch…Aaron?"

"You didn't leave."

"I'll never leave you Boss."

Aaron smiled. "Don't call me Boss."

fin


End file.
